Splintered Heart (12 page)

Ferris knew the bathroom was behind the bamboo framed door that was a montage of photographs — Andrea in the nude, interspersed with professional shots of Andrea modeling hats, panty hose and liquid detergents. The montage was as outrageous, as unexpectedly provocative as Andrea herself was — she was dashing in and out of the bathroom, doing things to her hair, spraying on whatever it was that she sprayed on to give her a Lily of the Valley fragrance while simultaneously serving Ferris a drink, paper napkin, coaster, and a plate of things to nibble on.

"Well Ferris, don't just stand there," Andrea said. "Why don't you make yourself comfortable!"

There was only one place to sit, aside from the bed. Marian's trip to the institution had given Ferris an opportunity to explain face to face that they couldn't meet anymore, so Ferris sat down the swing.

It was a large basket which was attached with chains and bolts to the ceiling. The silver table in front of him looked futuristic. The lamp was a bus stop sign ingeniously bent into an off balance position that seemed to defy the laws of gravity. At his feet, the bed was a collection of pillows on an extra thick, extra large foam mat — it took up most of the remaining floor space.

Ferris invariably ended up feeling like the bus stop sign — in an off-balance dither, whenever he was with Andrea.

"You looked so uptight when you walked in," Andrea said after Ferris took a gulp of his martini. "Now, you look cool!" She did an imitation of how he'd looked when he walked in — stiff, aged, wrinkled brow. Presto, she became Ferris looking cool.

"You make me look like old Grandpa Cooper," Ferris chuckled, but he did not like being considered old and uptight.

"Aren't my nails fabulous?" Andrea became the model, demonstrating with lavish gestures that she was lathering on hand lotion, "Do I get the job?" Without waiting for his reply, she moved on to another topic. "I got a job, Ferris — a toy show at the Coliseum — two hundred dollars a day! It's ten days of work but if they like me, I'll get to go to London with the show. I'm supposed to stand on a turntable, six feet off the ground in a
Wonder
Woman
outfit and do a thirty-second spiel every five minutes. They're wiring me with a chest mike. Now where am I going to hide a chest mike in a Wonder Woman outfit? It's cut to here..." Andrea demonstrated where
here
was, then pulled a script out from under a pillow, plopped herself down on the bed, and beckoned to him, "Come on down sweetie, and help me with my script."

Ferris got off the swing and sat down on one of the pillows.

"What's bugging you, Ferris?" She was turning the pages of her script. "I know your wife is back. Myra told me."

Ferris cleared his throat. "Myra shouldn't have telephoned me at home, Andrea."

"Why not? Myra's telephoned me at your place before. She didn't know your wife was back. Neither did I."

"You knew I was married, Andy. I've always been honest with you."

Andrea gave Ferris a kittenish smile. "You didn't come over here to take me out for a Sunday brunch, did you?"

"Andy, you and I…we've had some good times together, but my wife and I...well..." Ferris let it sit there.

Andrea let it sit there. She went back to turning pages of her script, clucking over what she was reading.

Ferris was never sure what was going on in Andrea's mind. Sometimes she was a self-centered model — absorbed in fingernails, the state of her complexion, what to wear, who she needed to get to know in order to advance her career. Other times, Andrea was mother-woman — tender, sensitive, expert lover who acted as if he, the man, was the center of her universe.

There were also other Andreas. Sometimes she was a creature who belonged to the world of bent-over bus stop signs. Her ideas seemed so foreign to Ferris that he had to stay on guard so that he wouldn't appear to be Grandpa Cooper.

He knew that to Andrea it was clear and simple — do what you have to do to please your guy,

Marian's way of thinking was a world Ferris understood. It had to do being civilized, considerate, unselfish, thoughtful, virtuous, and responsible.

"Andrea, put down that damn script!" Guilt came on him, flattening him down like a steam roller, "Andrea, listen to me!"

Andrea listened. Ferris explained. He made it very clear that he loved Marian. He was unequivocal, definite — his relationship with Andrea had to end. When he was finished, his hands were sweating. He was braced for the girl's tears and anger and questions.

Andrea lay back and stretched. "Do you want to play now?" she asked, unbuttoning one of the two buttons on her shirt.

"Didn't you understand anything that I said? Andy, I can't. It's over!"

"O.K.!" She softly mimicked his tone of voice. "'It's over!'" She fiddled with her second button. "But you're here and I'm here so what's the big deal?"

At exactly five-thirty, which was the time he had planned to leave his office so he could be home when Marian returned, Ferris was dressed and ready to go out Andrea's door.

Andrea was concentrating on re-buttoning the buttons in her shirt. "If any jobs come up you'll phone me won't you? I'll only be in England for a couple of weeks. No big deal — but promise me you'll phone me, you'll keep me in mind if any T.V. work comes up?"

Just for a second, Ferris wondered if Andrea wasn't play-acting the modern girl who had an easy-come, easy-go attitude toward her lovers.

"I'll telephone you Andrea, if anything comes up." Ferris promised.

"Well, I'm here if you need me," Andrea blew a kiss and closed the door gently.

"If she's playing a part, she's certainly a talented actress," Ferris said to himself, as he was going down Andrea's stairs, resolving "Never again!"

++++++++++

Chapter 13

"Welcome home!" Edna said, handing Marian a brilliant magenta Azalea in a gold foiled, covered pot.

"You look fantastic, Mari!" Robbie announced.

"Fantastic," Derek echoed. "Wow, did we miss you!"

Kate and Sandra stood up at their desks to wave.

The staff welcomed Marian as if she were a heroine back from the wars. There was no confetti, but greetings and compliments were showered down upon Marian like posies. There were at least fifteen individual conversations as Marian progressed slowly from the glass door entrance through the el-shaped corridor of nine offices and work areas to the "Living Room" — that's what Elena had started calling it, and the name caught on.

Combining five medium sized offices, taking down partitions and walls to form one large open space had been Elena's idea, and Marian had taken a vision of an October forest and put it indoors. The five desks, twenty odd chairs, couches, tables, lamps, area rugs were all different, but harmonious. At first Marian was afraid it might look like a furniture store, but with Elena's help, she'd positioned the pieces carefully, and it looked like living quarters. That was the idea. Marian wanted her five department heads to be able to work privately, as if at home. At the same time, there was a feeling throughout the twenty-ninth floor, that all the forty-two employees of the
Foundation Research Exchange
were one big happy family.

The entrance to the private office for the Director of
FRE
was behind a hanging silk screen. You had to go down two steps; then you saw blue-grey and blue-green shimmering watercolors that flowed from ceiling to floor. There were no edges to indicate where wall became floor and floor became ceiling, there was just one plain chair, a green park bench instead of a couch, no desk, just a very large grey wood table that looked as if it had been washed for hundreds of years by the waves.

What made the room spectacular were the high wide windows. You could see for miles — the sky outside, the borough on the other side of the silvery looking river which seemed to be a decorative border that a painter had put there, just to make the picture more attractive.

Marian had designed the perfect place where she could think without distractions, except when she wanted the distraction of the world below and beyond.

Marian put down the Azalea plant, then her purse. The effusive greetings were still ringing in her ears.

The employees had made it a festival of flowers. They were all over the driftwood table — pinks and geraniums with cards from the Publicity Department and the Writers Group; the clerical and accounting staff had contributed a large bunch of chrysanthemums.

For a half-second Marian wished she were back in her maid's room looking out of its little window, where there were just brick walls and blank windows across a grey courtyard. Marian did not feel quite ready for the sky, the sea green, and thinking clear bright thoughts in the clear bright light of her office.

She was not feeling very loved, or loveable for that matter. The stiff goodbye that morning in the doorway with Ferris was still with her — his tense smile, his tone when he'd said "see you later" and no kiss.

Suddenly, Marian knew, as certainly as if it were a film clip rolling before her, Ferris had to have met with the girl, kissed
her
goodbye, not stiffly...
probably yesterday, when he hadn't answered the office phone
...

Marian put her hands to her eyes.

"Mari, what's the matter?" Elena burst into the room — that was Elena, always bursting, exploding, and erupting as she appeared.

"Oh, I think I'm probably coming down with a cold. You know how I always catch a cold when I get back from one of my trips." Marian pretended she was looking for something in her purse.

Elena was wearing the red knit dress she'd described over the phone, carrying a spray of red rose blooms, looking like a rose herself as she plunked down a vase. "I'm late, I wanted it perfect, perfecto for you when you walked in!" Immediately, she was organizing the flowers, the papers she'd brought in, buzzing Nancy to hold all calls.

Marian could only stand there like a statue around which Elena was whirling, getting things ready.

"I'm so happy that you decided to come back today. We've got ourselves a twenty-third client, as of today! And you won't believe the list of phone calls!
Somerset
wants a conference meeting. The Ford people insist on talking to you about the
American
Biological
grant. The Big Bad Wolf has already called twice. And that lady, Mrs. Beth Weidman, she's called at least six times from Los Angeles. Very urgent. I wouldn't give her your home phone. She's furious with me, furious!" Elena had a habit of using the same adjective twice, as if there weren't enough adjectives in her vocabulary. It was a leftover from the days when Elena hadn't been fluent in English. "Beth Weidman is a Senator's wife, and President of the California
Caucus
Club
— she expects to be given your home number, I'm afraid. I put on my best Secretary voice, and told her as far as I knew, you were still out of town."

"Well, I'm in the directory, if Beth really had something urgent, she could have gotten the number from Information." Marian knew that fussing seemed to give her California friend a feeling of accomplishing something.

"I just didn't want anything to disturb you — you and Ferris are like newlyweds!"

Marian turned to look out the windows.

Elena continued her report. "I'm having a crisis with Nancy. She seems to think it's O.K. to come in late, leave early and take a two-hour lunch. The grapevine's buzzing about the
thing
she's got going with Eddie."

"Eddie — the college boy you hired for the mail room?"

"He just looks like a college boy but he's not. We can't groom Nancy for a better job if she's going to get herself involved."

They were both thinking of Victor Parsons and the difficulties Elena herself had, the one time she'd been involved with another staff member.

No one, not even the grapevine had guessed about Elena and the head writer. With his pots of ivy and his Shakespeare, Victor was always the model employee. What a shock on Victor's last day, for Elena to arrive with a terrible black eye, to learn that Victor was to blame, that he'd been one of Elena's mad passionate affairs.

"I learned my lesson with Victor," Elena was saying, "but love is blind! That's why I'm so damn annoyed about Nancy."

"Nancy might develop into a valuable staff member if we can get her focused on something creative, Elena."

"Maybe she can help with this?" Elena handed Marian an eleven-by- fourteen paste-up board, "I had Bill and Sandy whip up a logo for you, based on what you said — 'planting children instead of trees' — I just love that idea of yours, Mari. But I'm not sure Sandy's done the right thing, what do you think?"

"I think I've got to catch my breath " Marian put the pasteboard on the driftwood table.

"Want coffee or tea? Shall I buzz Nancy?"

"You haven't said a word about my California outfit," Marian knew Elena was studying her, so she did a model's pivot. Picking what to wear that morning hadn't been easy — grey sweater and skirt was what she'd wanted to put on, but Marian didn't want anyone guessing her mood. "The beige color isn't very practical, but it fits well, don't you think?"